Meet the 'Spoonbenders'

. June 19, 2014
Meet the 'Spoonbenders'

Wine meets beer in the latest experimental collaborative brew from Yeastie Boys - introducing the 'Spoonbenders'....

Wellington-based brewers Yeastie Boys, who can always be relied upon for interestingly experimental beers, have announced the worldwide release of their ‘Spoonbender’ collaborative series. 

 The three beers, which have been brewed in collaboration with Australian winemakers Some Young Punks, use botrytised viognier in an innovative brewing process that sees the wine turned into candi-sugar before it is re-fermented in the beer.

These unique ales are believed to be a world first. Yeastie Boys were awarded the Morton Coutts Trophy for Innovation in 2011 for their heavily-peated “whisky beer” ‘Rex Attitude’ and are well known for their flagship beer ‘Gunnamatta’, an Earl Grey IPA, which was awarded champion beer at the Great Australasian Beer SpecTapular 2012. 

Yeastie Boys' Creative Director, Stu McKinlay, says their reputation for experimental beer pretty tends to attract like-minded people. “The guys from Some Young Punks certainly fit that bill and when we had breakfast with them, the ideas just started bouncing around. I walked away really buzzing but it took two years to actually bring the idea from concept to keg and bottle."

The Spoonbender name is a play on ‘spooning’, which Stu says is their term for collaboration.  The names of the three individual beers (‘The Sly Persuader’, ‘The Sun Before the Darkness’ and ‘The Last Dictator’) are inspired by Crime & The City Solution’s 1990 album Paradise Discotheque.

All three Spoonbenders will be released nationwide from 30th June, through Yeastie Boys’ exclusive distribution partner Federal Merchants, and available in Australia from August through Phoenix Beers.

Find out more at www.yeastieboys.co.nz